I know that there’s a few people that enjoy the SpoCoPro section of my site including myself, but I believe the experiment has failed. I believe I have learned something: Their are no “tricks” to having a successful, and long lasting endurance for creating comics.  Bare bones; it comes down to sheer will-power and determination.  Something I’m very tired of not having. That being said, I’m cutting my losses and clenching my teeth towards taking some time to write a short story based in Parneesha.  So look forward to a new section or “page” on scarnart.com/blog or possibly an actual site at Scarnart.com (depending how determined I am to put it together myself).

 … I’m still drawing… I’m just not posting… often.   For some reason… I can’t get the thumbnails to go… DOOWNN!… stupid thumbnails. The internet is borken. ( you read right.) 

*Edit, I have no idea what I did… but I got it to work. Yay me! The Borken Internets loses! 

Sketches from work breaks…  

PART 2

I’ve completed another concept of Samus’ would-be suit, and this time I feel I’ve come closer to the steam-punk feel.

but…

As I’ve been sketching I’ve learned that the morph ball is going to present some serious design issues sometime down the road, as for now I’m trying to ignore it. Although unfortunately, that won’t work forever. As of now it’s just this shell-like casing that extends to form a “wheel” around Samus, connecting to the circular shields on the side of her knees. The basic idea is roughly sketched out on the second image above, when it’s fully formed ( click to view ). However, I think in this newer image, it looks terrible from a design stand-point and I’ve realised that the center of this wheel is behind her back somewhere, and if it were to form, it would probably cut off her legs. and we don’t want that, now do we.

On her right arm is the device that will provide the fps-style gameplay, that I feel is necessary to keep the feel of the Metroid series. It provides that style of gameplay by using the compressed steam from her right shoulder “boiler” ( which might become just a capsule full of highly compressed steam instead ) to spew various acidic/explosive liquids. So Samus could very well have a flamethrower in there to if the Chozo felt it necessary. And since she is on an alien planet, who knows what kinds of acidic compounds  could be derrived. On her left arm is my first real attempt at fleshing out her grapple hook. The pointed tip of the device opens up to reveal a harpoon-like ammunition that is attached to a long line of … a very strong metal-like cord… strong enough to haul her massivly heavy suit up to ledges and stuff. Or to keep past game-play continuing; to rip enemies shields, and armour off, which is always fun.

Ummm what else? Oh yes, I’m not entirely happy about the “goggle” style mask, as I think the “T” shaped visor is a large part of what makes Samus’ suit look like Samus’ suit. I tried to incorporate the look, but I’m not sure it worked. However with this goggle-style mask/helmet their are different “functions” that allow her to see in infrared, or have night vision, or maybe even x-ray ( hey we’re on an alien planet populated by an intensely intelligent race of super-aliens, keep your creative minds open! ). To “activate” these functions, she would simply flip the “glass” disks over her goggles and voila! Instant “I-can-see-your-bones” vision!

As far as the rest of the suit goes, it’s a pretty standard suit of armour made of - you guessed it, alien metal, that provides super-strong-energy-impact-absorbing protection while maintaning a managable “I-can-totally-lift-this” weight! Huzzah! The design excuse continues to amase and astound!

Click to view.

Again, if this gets your creative brain intrigued: Please, I welcome the impeding clash of concepts!

… the journey begins.

PART 1

 Over at thewiire.com their was a discussion about how the next “The Legend of Zelda” game may be based in more of a futuristic setting. Some people felt that doing so would be blasphemy and would ruin the franchise. Okay, it wasn’t as harsh as I’ve made it out to be - but people were mainly against the idea, and felt that the Metroid series, starring bounty hunter Samus Aran, was the futuristic franchise for Nintendo. I, however - being a gamer quickly losing interest in games, feel that a futuristic setting could freshen up the Zelda franchise considerably.

This got me thinking… if Zelda were to become more futuristicly geared, what if the current sci-fi series Metroid, became medieval? Thinking further on this, their are a few things I believe can not be changed without losing the “essence” of the series.

1) The Morph Ball

2) Samus’ suit ( simply having a suit)

3) FPS style game-play.

With these three things in mind I believe that a strictly “medieval” setting for my imaginary game could not function without players going ” WTFrik is he tryin’ to pull?”, so I decided to “tech-it-up” a bit, and utilise the Steampunk genre.

 [ For those of you who are hearing the term Steampunk for the first time, in a nutshell it’s as if people in the 1800’s or the steam-powered era, knew what we know today technology-wise built fanciful machines using the only readily available powersource of their time: Steam.]

So now that I have my excuse to still keep Samus in her suit, I needed a plot. Well I didn’t really need a plot, but being a story-teller at heart I felt my designs could benefit from one. Oh, and I’m not an expert on the history of Samus Aran and her plights against the ever-annoying space pirates, so bear with me if my idea grates on your strict need for plot continuity.

 Also this is the first time I’m actually writting this out, as I came up with it at work of where I have too much time to think, so bear with me.

——

PRESENT DAY - ( future, space, lasers all that good stuff )

Samus Aran takes the bounty to help out in a situation where the dreaded Space pirates have boarded the ever impressive vessel Annuli.  The Annuli - a ship designed with the capability to change the events of time in a localised field is found orbiting an ancient planet long ago destroyed and decayed. As Samus approaches, the Annuli begins to power up it’s main time-altering cannon, and moves into position. Samus attempts to board the vessel but is quickly shot down and which forces her to make an emergency landing on the abandoned world. She blacks out just as the planet is engulfed in an energy she’s never seen before. Waking up she see’s that world around her has been changed; renewed to its former state of glory. She’s been sent back in time along with the rest of the planet! Powered by technology no - longer existing, her suit eventually loses power. Fearing that she will never get off the world, she powers down her ship to conserve what’s left, and goes to take a look around. Her hope is renewed when she discovers that the planet she’s on was once a Chozo homeworld, the race who originally designed her suit and matching ship! Even so, the technology that she’s used to hasn’t been invented yet, but she allows them to examine her suit and ship as they are her only hope of restoring everthing to normal and saving the galaxy - again. In the mean time, Space Pirates are making their way onto the world and she’s going to need functional gear!

As the game progresses questions such as ” Why would the space pirates target the Chozo homeworld?” and “how are the space pirates penetrating the time field?” arise, and in time - are answered.

In the end Samus steals the technology the Space Pirates are using to penetrate the time barrier and boards the Annuli to shut it down.

 ——

Therein lies the premise for my imaginary game. I currently just have a couple crummy concept sketches of what her Steampunk-esque battle suit may look like, as I’m sure I’ll have a few more crummy designs before I decide on a version to render to the best to my ability.

 I would also like to take this oppertunity to explore what some of the environments could look like that I would also like to render at a presentable level.

I will try to keep the concepts coming, but a friendly reminder now and then is always helpful.

Feel free to explore the imaginary game further: who knows, I may just draw something based on your idea!

I’m fairly happy with the quality of this page - just wish I could have worked up the desire to finish it sooner. All the same, another one to staple to my wall!

About the Update: Darrell and the still  un-named character are spotted! What will they do?? what will they do?! SOMEONE TELL MEEEEEEE!

So updates have been few and far-between as of late, but I hope you can enjoy this little SpoCoPro concept sketch that I had time to do at work a couple days ago.   As for the Zuda thing that I’m involved with, I dunno - the guy I’m in contact with has gone M.I.A. for no apparent reason. I think that the other guy that was appart of the team either quit, or has scheduling issues - or even the guy I mainly work with is having the scheduling issues. The last I heard from him was when he asked if I could do text for comics, I said I could, sent him some examples and he hasn’t responded yet. What I know for sure is that we won’t be making the August deadline that was previously set. I’ve also muscled my older brother to implement a new message system into the blogs called “Intense Debate”. Apparently it only takes 5-10 minutes to set up, so it’s not like I achieved some great victory when he agreed to do it for me. Neways, If you sign up, you can use that username and pass. for anyother site that uses the feature. You can also vote on other members comments if you like them ( or dislike them) and people can also “follow” you - which is a way of saying that they like what you have to say, they will essentially go to all the sites you post on using this feature, just to oogle the words you type - and be all like ” ZOMGz He can Spell! “But yes, as this feature will not install on threads that already have comments ( which ultimately is really nice), I have deleted a few posts where I feel it would benifit to have this new system running.Thx!

I needed to get it out of my system. I was browsing through my sketch folder and decided to do another one of Faceless. A semi-intelligent creature closely related to the Saskwatch. Bearing no face of it’s own, it fashions itself crude masks of bark and clay.

Well, the submission went well and it seems that I will be the colourist for the new comic “The Ballad of Pepper Slamowitz” which hits an upcoming competition on Zuda.com in a couple of months. More details to come… if I’m allowed to say.

In the meantime, updates will most likely become slower, and I hope to get myself some form of day-timer/life scheduler thing-a-ma-bob to help cut down on “wasted time”. I’m leaning towards something digital, but if what I find is too expensive, I’ll probably just get a small booklet that can fit inside one of my back pockets so I can take it to work.

Let me know if any of you have or know of something that’s good, I’d appreciate the help.

First off, I refuse to apologise for the slow Spocopro updates, as the comic is first and foremost for my personal pleasure! Second, I apologise for the slow Spocopro updates, as I have been busy pursuing a chance of fame! FAME!

OK,  so Zuda isn’t entirely fame and fortune, but it’s a step in the right direction to where I’d like to be - at least I think, I suppose it’s possible that when I reach my life’s goals I’ll want to turn around and go back.

–All the same - I’ve submitted a demo of my colouring skills to two other Christian fellows who want to test their skills against other Zuda submssions in hopes of being the leader of the pack and blowing the popsicle stand with some fresh casheronie pizza. On top of the “prize” money, their names ( as well as hopefully mine) will garner some attention, and people who enjoy the viewing will continue to search for other work done by them ( and hopefully me). As I’ve said, not huge, but a step.

On top of the Zuda colour thing, I’ve also been busy with writing some scripts for some upcoming short and long stories based in Parneesha. The originial epic - included. And I believe it is right to call it an epic, as the first chapter will probably be close to 50 pages (ughhhh). I’ll probably change it to the first book instead of chapter and release it as such. Hopefully building some hype and popularity for the next 20 or so books…. so I guess I have my next 10 years all planned out…

…

maybe I’ll just start with a couple really short stories. like… half a page… and doodles… and I’ll commission kids with candy to do it for me while I cry myself to sleep.

…

THIS HAS BEEN WORDS FROM THE BLOGGER!!
Scarn has signed off.

Here’s to another 10 spocopro pages!

I’ll be going to an encounter this weekend so I figured I’d update this page early so it’d be one less thing I’ll have to worry about tomorrow.

About the Update:  Danger on the horizon.